


He Knows

by disreputabledog



Series: Prompted Shorts [4]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Living Together, M/M, Present Tense, Stanford Era
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-12
Updated: 2013-09-12
Packaged: 2017-12-26 08:41:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,372
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/963915
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/disreputabledog/pseuds/disreputabledog
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><a href="http://thedisreputabledog.tumblr.com/post/60989826986/ring-ring-ring-ring-click-this-is-dean">Tumblr prompt</a>: A few months after Sam leaves to go to college Dean disappears with the Impala. Almost a year later John finds out just where Dean went when he finds a porn video containing BOTH of his boys.</p>
            </blockquote>





	He Knows

**Author's Note:**

  * For [lostinmymindforever](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lostinmymindforever/gifts).



_[RING]_  
 _[RING]_  
 _[RING]_  
 _[RING]_  
 _[CLICK] This is Dean. If you’ve got this number, you know what to do._  
 _[BEEP]_  
"…Ah, fuck."  
 _[BEEP] If you are satisfied with your message, please press—_  
 _[BEEP] Message erased._  
 _[CLICK]_

 _[RING]_  
[CLICK] You have: one new message. To listen to your messages—  
[BEEP] First message, received Friday, 8:03 PM.  
"Son. I don’t expect you to call me back but, just listen. Don’t hang up. Hear me out. Even if you think you’re not gonna like what I have to say. I, uh. I saw one of your videos. The ones with Sammy.  _[throat clearing]_  Not exactly the way a man wants to see his sons after a year. _[rustling sounds]_  But you, uh. You both look good.  _[coughing]_  You know, healthy. Safe, alive. That’s good. I’m glad. Look, I can’t say I understand. But I can’t say I’m surprised either. The way I raised you boys, well.  _[breathing]_  Anyway. I know what I said to Sam when he left, and you didn’t say a damn thing to me when you went off, but. That’s done with. If you ever want to see me again, you know how to reach me.”  
 _[CLICK]_  
 _[BEEP] If you would like to delete this message, press 7. If you would like to save it—_  
 _[BEEP] Message saved. You have: no new—_  
 _[CLICK]_

With a strangled noise, Dean tosses his phone vaguely in the direction of the passenger seat. He hears it make contact with a quiet thump and a clatter as it bounces off Sam’s lap and falls into the footwell.

“Dude, what the hell?”

Dean just shakes his head and tightens his hands on the wheel. His mind keeps turning in circles. He’s pretty sure if you held your ear close to his skull you’d hear a whirring noise like the laptop makes right before Sam yells at him for watching too much porn on it. Dad had seen one of the videos. That means he  _knows_. Which means they’re screwed. But it also means that _Dad_  watched  _gay porn_ , which, since when was that the case? It was one of the reasons they’d decided this little scheme would be safe, because Hell would freeze over before John Winchester would ever watch two dudes fucking on camera. Right?

“Dean?” Sam’s voice has lost its annoyance and gained that nearly undetectable quiver that means he is actually worried and trying not to spook Dean.

“That was Dad.”

“Dad? Really?” Sam snorts in derision. “I thought he’d finally given up. Never once called me trying to get me to come home, but you bug out and he’s blowing up your phone for weeks. Why did you even keep that number, anyway?”

“Sammy. He knows. He saw one of our vids.”

Dean doesn’t have to turn his head to know the color is draining from Sam’s face as the silence stretches out. Eyes on the road, that’s how they’ll get through this, that’s how they get through everything.  _You and me against the world._

“Which, uh, which one?”

“He didn’t say.” It doesn’t really matter. They are all damning. He and Sam had been together for months before they decided to film some of their favorite things, and it had been at least another month before an offhand comment put the idea in their heads that they could actually make money doing it.

“Dean, what…what do we do?” Sam’s hand finds its way to Dean’s thigh in a frantic grip. Dean does look at him then, takes his hand and kisses the knuckles as his brother continues. “We have a good thing here. I’m doing well at Stanford, you’re gonna have your associate’s in no time, we’re together and no one cares and things are finally fucking normal for the first time in my life. I don’t want to run again.”

“You won’t have to. We’re not going anywhere.” He gives Sam’s hand a reassuring squeeze as they pull into the parking lot of their apartment building. When Sam moves to carry one of the bags of groceries they’d gone out for, Dean waves him on ahead and gets them all himself. Dad’s phone call must have come through while they were in the store. If he’s carrying eggs and ice cream and glass bottles of root beer he’ll have less of an urge to bloody his hands punching walls at the panic and determination welling in his brother’s eyes. It wouldn’t help calm either of their nerves anyway.

For the next few minutes they both focus on the rituals of coming home, still so strange to Dean, but he’s comforted by how easily Sam has relaxed into having one. The stability has been good for Sam; he slouches less, fills up a room more with the confidence of someone who knows where he belongs, instead of the cagy bravura of someone who’s not looking for trouble but will damn well finish any fight another guy feels like starting. Dean hasn’t acclimated as quickly, but whenever he gets that rambling itch under his skin Sammy just hands him his leather jacket and car keys and they hit the road together. California is big, with Oregon, Nevada and Arizona only a day’s drive away. Ocean, mountains, desert, woodlands, snow; little towns and big cities. Dean never feels trapped with his baby humming beneath him and his brother riding shotgun. Sam sleeps, does homework, bitches about his music choices and sings along anyway, pink mouth wide and happy. And somehow the drive is all the sweeter for having their own familiar bed to return to afterwards. He runs his hand over a kitchen cupboard as he closes it.

“What did he say?” Sam finally speaks. Dean jerks his head toward the couch and Sam follows him over to it. When Dean sits down, Sam curls up next to him and burrows under Dean’s arm, floppy hair hiding his eyes. They stay like that for a moment, Sam’s breath wafting warm against Dean’s chest.

“He said we looked good.” Sam chokes and splutters on his next inhale. “Not like that. At least, I don’t think so. Just glad we’re alive. I didn’t exactly tell him where I was going when I left. I suppose it wasn’t that hard to guess, but he never bothered to find out beyond the phone calls that I didn’t answer. For all he knew we both could have been dead, and him the last Winchester left alive to avenge us all.”

“Serve him right if he was,” Sam mutters, but Dean knows he doesn’t quite mean it.

He strokes his fingers through his brother’s hair. Some of the tension leaves Sam’s shoulders and he melts against Dean. “C’mon kid, you’ve got homework still. I’ll make us some dinner. Burgers sound good?”

“Fuck you, I’m nineteen, I’m not a kid,” and Dean can feel Sam’s smile pressed against him.

“Sure you are. You’re my very own barely legal stud muffin.” A beat of silence greets his solemn statement, but Dean can’t keep a straight face and soon he’s bent over laughing at his own bad joke while Sam beats at his arms with both fists. Finally Dean relents and lets him up for some air. The sight of his little brother’s flushed cheeks and tousled hair is…fuck, it’s too much, and his heart feels too tight, and he grabs Sam’s face and kisses him, and he can’t believe that he gets to do this whenever he wants. Sam clings to him and kisses back, a desperate little moan that Dean can never get enough of rising from his throat when Dean catches his lip between his teeth.

Dean’s hungry for Sam but he’s also hungry for food, and this is his life now, where he can have both. With one last insistent press of his tongue against the roof of Sam’s mouth, he stands up and pulls Sam with him. “C’mon bitch. You’re gonna need some red meat in you to make it through what I’ve got planned for you tonight.”

“Ugh, jerk, how can you even think about food right now,” Sam grumbles but follows him to the kitchen, slips one oversized hand into Dean’s back pocket and squeezes.

**Author's Note:**

> I expect I will write more of this at some point—the boys filming something, or John actually watching the video. I'll update the rating and tags when I do.


End file.
